Got one but never use it as the asphalt driveway in front of the garage is too rough. Use a $6 Harbor Freight moving blanket. Fold up an end as a pillow if I'll be in the same spot for awhile. When it gets too oily or greasy after about a year, I toss it and replace it. Have a couple of old Boogie boards I use for kneeling mats when pulling/installing wheels with the impact, doing brake jobs, etc.
I have an old lisle low profile jeepers creepers. I also have four lifts in my shop. But sonofabitch I like getting on that old creeper an' just roll around.
I have a creeper, I have two, used them for rolling under motor homes to perform inspections. Don't do that anymore, doesn't take long to walk around underneath the car, I have a lift. . And if I have to do it on the ground, cardboard or harbor cheap moving blankets
My 40 year old NAPA wood creeper is in excellent condition except for the corners. The corners have taken a beating over the years from being tossed across the shop when I get pissed off trying to use it. I like cardboard.
Remind me to tell y'all the story someday about me, a steel-wheeled creeper and an ordinary lamp cord (using desk lamp for trouble light)
When I worked as a truck mechanic a creeper was absolutely mandatory. We used a torch a lot and lying on anything flammable would have been disastrous! I bought one of those high buck crepers with an adjustable headrest off the tool truck after my back surgery and ended up selling it at the local swap meet after I healed. I still have my cheapie wooden creeper and use it whenever I weld or use my torch under the car. Otherwise I use my "south Omaha creeper" a nice piece of cardboard. And sometimes a hunk of carpet on top of the cardboard when it's cold.
Hello, When we were racing the 1958 Chevy Impala at Lions, we had a system. My brother did the general maintenance. I was responsible for the spark plug changes and gaps. (later on, I adjusted the valves and timed the motor.) But, on every Thursday, my homework was to replace the 4:11 rear gears (complete 3rd member) for a 4:56 set of gears. In goes the hydraulic jack, the two jackstands and the axle pullers. At first, it was an old bedspread, but my back and the cold concrete made it difficult to concentrate. So, my dad got a cool flat wooden “creeper” from his mechanic friend in Los Angeles. In the zillion times we went to L.A. we always stopped at this gas station and saw his mechanics rolling in and out on these flat sheets of wood. Now, after all of these years, we had one for our selves. vintage photos Of course, we took it to a road that had a slight incline to use it as a sled. (Dragging our toes to steer and brake.) Our mom did not understand why our tennies had flat surfaces on the toes. We even used our Schwinn bikes to tow the other sitting on these creepers like the water skiers down in the Long Beach Harbor. Those weird wheels did not make handling these wood sleds very accurate, resulting in many wipeouts. But, fun is fun on weird things, especially if the timing was right. The whole process of exchanging one third member for the other took me several hours depending on how many breaks I took. (Wheels, axles, loosen oil drain, remove multiple nuts, blocks of 2x4/ plywood and metal jack stands for support, slide the new complete gear housing nearby, drop the old one, prop up the new one, bolt multiple nuts, put Positraction oil back in, cap, axles, wheels, lug nuts…) The Positraction 4:11/4:56 gears also required this nasty smelling fluid made for Positraction rear ends only. It was a cross between fish oil and garbage. So, draining the original and sometimes replacing it with new Positraction fluid was just part of the Thursday pre-race activities in So Cal. Was my brother smart in getting me to do all of the hard work under the car while he was inside listening to music? I was getting really good at being a repair mechanic and I actually liked it. Well, at least I could hear the music…(He kept telling me that his back was bad and that I was really good at fixing things. Older brothers, evil tricksters all.) Once, I was so tired that I did fall asleep on that creeper… After the Saturday races, on Sunday morning, it was the complete opposite. Replace the 4:56 for the normal 4:11 gears. Unless, of course, it was late Sunday coming home from the drags at Pomona and I wanted to use the car that Friday at the local Cherry Ave. races. Did it make a difference for gear changes? Yes, definitely…the 4:11 times were in the low 15 sec ET range. The 4:56 were in the mid to high 14 sec ET range. Plus, have you ever driven on the freeway with 4:56 gears? It was a different kind of screamer… (Once, coming home from the Winternationals as spectators with the 58 Impala on the 10 freeway, we kept being told to shift to 3rd by racers next to us. The stick hydro shift lever was up near the 2nd gear position of a 3 speed stick. It looked like we were still in 2nd going 60+ on the freeway) The 4:11 gears were perfect for the street, daily driving and racing. But, when we knew something big was brewing for the street races, the 4:56 gears stayed in place for another week or two. Jnaki Some of those new creepers with lift up head area and padding all over would have put me to sleep before I got the axles pulled. Ha… We even took this idea of the low slung wheeled platform and welded a cross braced, metal one. This angle iron metal one was very strong and had steel roller skates on the bottom to move the engine around. (no modern rolling engine stands back then) Then after the engine was installed, the heavy 4:56 third member used the metal platform for its resting place until the next week’s install. Perfect for rolling it under the car right up to the hole in the rear axle housing. 30 years later, I made one out of wood and put modern skateboard wheels and trucks on it for a mini creeper to move furniture and heavy items. That lasted until I saw a wooden platform with industrial rubber wheels and purchased it on the spot. With the addition of a heavy duty nylon strap screwed to the bottom, pulling heavy items was so much easier. So much for innovations…
i have a creeper but when needed i use a refrigerator cardboard packing box....the only problem is it's so comfy i keep falling asleep on it
Have one of those. The rubber "tire" separated from 2 of the caster wheels in a short time. I replaced them with some std casters, but it doesn't move as smoothly as it should. IDK,.... maybe excessive weight has something to do with it (?) Would like to find something better. Years ago we used the plain wooden ones with 4 swivels; they worked great, and were tough.
for years now I have just said we can use my $3000.00 creeper and just stand up. It is a 9K 2 post symmetrical. I also have a HF plastic unit that will drag the middle under the weight of my arse !
Hey Sq, Remember, the car was not mine at the time. I was 14-15 years old and just getting started doing real car stuff. Plus, mid 14 sec was a good time for an A/Stock Impala. In order to impress my older/wiser? brother, I liked doing those changes. I was also learning stuff that lasts forever. He taught me a lot of stuff, but we were both learning as we went along. A trophy winning 58 impala 348 was a good test mule as it gave us/me more confidence to do other stuff later on in our backyard hot rod garage. I did not like the cleaning up portion of any build, but someone had to do it. Today, garages are cleaner, the tools are better, the helping assortment of stuff to make a race car is better and most people wear gloves to do the work. Back then, gloves were for our baseball team. HA! I envy today's modern garages with all of the tools and stuff. Your build is pretty awesome and I suppose we did the best we could with the Impala and later on, the 40 Willys as a ground up race car build. I wish we had installed the expensive B&M hydro before we even went racing...maybe that would have changed the outcome. No more exploding clutches. The final note for us teenagers was that it was fun experimenting and learning stuff that we would use for many years later. Even today, (underneath the car or in tight, weird spaces) the right hand thumbs up tells me to follow my fingers to tighten a nut. Jnaki
Last time I used one I was in a bind. Had to put one arm down to push with the other. The creeper shifted and the old steel wheel caught the fat of my upper arm. The knot on my head didn't hurt near as much. My creeper came from the trach at Bell Helicopter in 1964. Needed only a bolt replaced. But it will hurt you.
And the sign says "anybody caught trespassing will be shot on sight" So I jumped the fence and I yelled at the house, hey! what gives you.... BANG! BANG! BANG! Has anyone else heard that version? I laughed my ass off the first time I heard it....
I guess Squirrel and I are the only ones here who know how to drive the damn things. I have a lift, so I don't use mine much, but my motorhome will not go on the lift, and sometimes it is just easier to roll under the car for something quick than it is to move stuff around and get on my lift. as for cold floors... I solve that problem by only working on stuff when it is warm.
My buddy has one of those "magic creepers", loves it. Brought it over and had me slide under a car with it, got to admit, seemed pretty slick. I might pick one up.
Clunker, I'd like to hear more about your fix for the HF creepers as I bought 2 when on sale and they drag in the middle like you said. What kind of foam was it, something like the "Great Stuff" or what? Did you put it in thru just one hole or multiple holes???????????
I have 4 various quality creepers hanging on my wall. I actually use them a lot. One is for me to roll around on. The others I use to roll stuff on. 3 well placed creepers make it pretty easy for 1 person to move an entire assembled front clip
Didn't want to cover up my question to Clunker about the foam in a HF creeper, so I saved other comments for this post. Had a "Bone", great creeper except it wasn't sized for me> I'm 6'3" and very "long waisted", so when I got on the "Bone", my buttcheeks were against the lower set of bulges for the wheels and my shoulders just barely fit in against the upper, or head end wheel bulges, my neck was on the head pad and my head was out over the top with no headrest. Needless to say, not too comfortable for exrended times. Did use it to roll under to pop a drain plug to change oil or other short duration work, and liked the easy rolling, low position, etc. so I kept it. Kept it hanging on a nail, brushed against it one day, it fell off the nail, it fell and shattered like it was glass. Didn't replace it due to poor fit for me. The ones now sold with dropped square tubing frames and 6 wheels work OK, but if you weigh 245# like me, expect to have to replace the particle board platform with good plywood in short order. Also keep those bolts going thru the frame to the casters tight, they will loosen often.
My creeper is just like jnaki's,I haven't used it since I've put a carpet remnant on the garage floor a while back. It's got a spot behind the bench now,ready if the need arises in the driveway. Lots of memories with that thing, would never toss it.
I have a nice new creeper leaning up against the wall in my garage that I bought about 10 years ago. I'll use it for the first time one of these days. I've been using cardboard.
I use the interlocking foam pads. They keep me clean, sorta, and off of the cold floor. I discovered several years ago that if you put your tools on a heating pad (you know, the one that you need to erase the aches and pains of working on the cold floor) the tools stay nice and warm and feel good in your hand. And we all know there isn't anything better than a warm tool.
One problem I have with pads, carpet, cardboard, etc. is that I need to move around under a car when I'm working on it, and I often spill oil on the floor when I'm under there. So if I cover the whole floor under the car with "creeper" material, then I'll get oil on it. If I use a piece that's only as big as me, I have to get up and move it and then get back down. With a creeper, I can just move around where I need to be, and it's easy to avoid the oil dripping onto me or the creeper. I'm sure glad I figured out how to drive a creeper.
I have never liked them and didn't use one back when I was younger and living at home because the garage wasn't big enough for it to save time and the drive way was gravel! So it didn't work there either haha. It ended up getting tossed around and eventually bent and thrown out. Never bothered to replace it.
I don't even own one, and i spend most of my non-working hours in the shop. It's tough working under a car after having a broken neck, still the cardboard works better for me. I quit using a creeper years ago (when i had hair), getting your hair in the wheels will make you pitch that creeper. That would not be a problem now, but pulling on my beard when i flip up my welding helmet sucks!
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